Barbados, NFAPost: Putting an end to the country’s 13-year drought in the global cricket arena, India’s men’s cricket team under Rohit Sharma’s captaincy won a nail-biter final game against South Africa in the Twenty20 World Cup match on Saturday.
India defeated South Africa by 7 runs in a thrilling summit clash while Virat Kohli’s 59-ball-76 and Hardik Pandya’s three crucial wickets played an important role to clinch the title.
India’s team captain Rohit Sharma said guys understand when the pressure is on what needs to be done.
“Today was a perfect example, [we] stuck together with backs to the wall. We wanted this really bad … very proud of the bunch of boys and the management,” said India’s team captain Rohit Sharma.
Both India and South Africa were undefeated going into Saturday’s match in Barbados. South Africa seemed like it had a chance of winning the game, but India thwarted the team’s attempt to exceed India’s 176 runs.
This was India’s second T20 World Cup win; the team won the inaugural T20 World Cup in 2007. It was also India’s first World Cup win in 13 years in any type of cricket, after a series of heartbreaking close final matches over the last 12 months.
Virat Kohli, one of the team’s top batters, played a key role in India’s eventual win over South Africa. The India team was in early trouble after deciding to bat first — they had only made 34 runs in the first five overs. This means that within the first quarter of India’s time batting, the team had averaged approximately only one run per ball.
Kohli announced at the end of the game that this would be his last time playing in the T20 World Cup.
“This was my last T20 World Cup, and this is what we wanted to achieve. I got the job done for the team on the day it mattered. It’s time for the next generation to take over, some amazing players will take the team forward and keep the flag waving high,” said Virat Kohli.
When South Africa went up to bat, the team looked strong: they had made 147 runs in 15 overs in part thanks to Heinrich Klaasen. But once he was out, the team started to falter: Marco Jansen scored only two runs before Indian bowler Jasprit Bumrah threw a ball that resulted in an out.
